Cain snorted, a dangerous smirk curling on his lips. “I might have believed that load of crock if you weren’t on the list of ‘Will Kill Me In Sleep.’” He opened one eye and looked up at her. “The way I see it, you’d be mighty fond of messing up my face right now if someone else could pilot this craft half as decent as I do.” Cain could almost hear Aleta chiding him in his ear as he said that. He even reached up to rub it out of habit. If he didn’t get along with the technicians, he must smolder under the doctor’s heels. To her, he was a constant and agonizing pain. To him, she was a demonic man trapped in a woman’s body. Even in his imagination she only seemed to want to chew on his neck. Not comfortable. What was the big deal anyway? He only did real damage when the Ardent got into trouble and needed a bit of raunchy steering to escape in relatively one piece. Try finding another pilot who could avoid sea monsters and marauders at the same flipping time and they can throw me off if they want, Cain thought as his smirk faded. He waved her off with a slurred “Fine by me,” and closed his eyes again.

“Nice arrow you’ve got there, Cain. Lovely.”

“Stop mocking my crotch,” Cain muttered without looking up. He already knew who it was and that she wasn’t making any sort of reference towards him in that way. When it came to Belo, things like that usually escaped him before he could stop himself. She probably wouldn’t remember it anyway, the drunkard. Correcting the previous thought, Belo was the a man trapped in a woman’s body with the way she went about her life. Aleta was just demonic. In all his years travelling the world and the dirtier parts of it, Cain had never run across a woman who could soak up more booze than Belo. He wasn’t even sure why she still worked on this ship anymore. Why he seemed to piss people off more than she did was beyond him. It had actually reached the point where he had become amazed by it rather than stumped. There hadn’t even been an exchange of greetings before Belo muttered something and disappeared below deck. He’d have to remember not to get the ship in any real danger, lest they need to rely on her.

He just barely caught the tale end of Cas actually laughing at Belo. Cain slowly sat up and gaped at her. “Pig shit,” he muttered, “You found that funny?” Cain was actually offended. When the elf had first arrived, he’d probably done everything in his power to make her crack a smirk and all he’d gotten was threats, lectures, and the occasional look that should strike him dead cold. Belo ploddles along piss-drunk and half-conscious and Cas finds it funny. What the hell was up with that?! It was because he’s a man. That tree inside her must have “Men” carved on its bark. The revelation was ground-breaking and raised more questions. If Cas hated men, who the hell’d she fornicate with? Cain looked up at her. That question needed investigating.

He lost the chance to bother her more when Aleta started speaking. She was insulting him as usual, and was interrupted by the first mate. He came up and began announcements. Captain was sick. They were taking off anyway. That was a bit of a surprise. The captain had always seemed like the man who never got sick. It explained why he hadn’t shown up yet though.

A new guy was standing nearby and the first mate turned to check his papers. Cain quirked an eyebrow and jerked a thumb at him. “When’d he show?” he asked Cas only to get snapped at for chatting by the first mate. He sighed and stood up, rolling his shoulders and faking a salute. “Right away, mate.” When the first mate turned away, Cain collapsed back in his seat. Little did he realize the first mate had turned to acknowledge his superior, the actual captain. He glanced up at Aleta, having missed most of what she’d say prior, and snorted. “The ship stays in one piece. That ain’t abuse, chickie.” It was barely morning and he was already being chided. If things kept at it, the day was going to be long. The company of a pretty lady would’ve been appreciated if it were someone else, but he hoped Cas would leave him be and go off to wherever she usually stayed when he was flying That was when he realized Captain Fort was already there. “Glad you could make it, Sir,” Cain said. It was probably the most awake he’d sounded all morning. “Ardent wouldn’t be the same withou’cha.” He liked the Captain. It was nice having another man aboard, not some petty excuse for one. This ship needed more men. Maybe the new guy would show some promise.

As soon as he got the closet thing to an “Ok” from Aleta, Cain leapt to his feet and kicked on the controls. A face-splitting grin curled his lips as he held the wheel. O yes. Marvelous. He handled the ship gently, minimal rocking, the movement hardly noticeable as yet. The ship had been docked for a few days and he knew the engines were cold. He’d kick up the speed after they travelled for a bit, outside of city limits. “Let’s keep things light,” he pulled his goggles down and pushed the scope aside. “For the Scholar kid.”

He pushed the throttle just a bit to get them heading out of the city at a decent pace. “Well, someone has to plunge into risk or no one will.” he answered to Captain Fort’s question. "And where's the fun in that?"

Slogan of his life.

Cas Seingalt turned slowly, her eyebrows quirked and mood quickly souring again. “You, Cain? Pilot this craft decentl—?”

Ah, the First Mate! Her attention immediately slipped away from the dickwad of a pilot to the ship’s second in command. Her brows furrowed in confusion, suspicious at his attempt to send the ship off without the Captain. An attempt at mutiny, or sabotage, perhaps? Slowly she placed her hand on the revolver at her hip, watching the two carefully. Her body was tense and her focus was concentrated completely on the pair. But the Captain seemed unconcerned with the First Mate, and the latter did not make any attempt to slip away or strike at the Captain. Paranoia on her part, then…Cas sighed. Of course. The Captain had chided her before for being overzealous in her loyalty to him, and some of the crew members seemed confused by it. The two shared no special bond, really, and she had no particular respect for the man. But the Captain was the closest thing she’d ever had to a god to serve. Elves rarely had children, and she had been the first born in the city, possibly at all, after the fall of their gods. To not so much as even meet the god she would one day lay down her life and body for was a very real, physical pain for her. The Captain, at the very least, was someone to take orders from. Cas sighed as she thought this, lowering her revolver and shifting her weight. Some replacement he was turning out to be.

Out of the corner of her eye she noticed the drunkard Innate puking over the side of the ship and into the water below. Her muscles tightened and her body tensed, watching the woman carefully. Cas had the distinct suspicion that it was Belo who had been leaving dead animals in her bedding. It would have been funny, had it been done to anyone else, but with Cas, Belo was walking a very fine line. Innates were abhorrent. If godschildren made her feel like waterfalls and streambeds, Innates made her feel like seasickness and heartburn. Everything about them, and Belo, was wrong, made her disgusted. The gods had created both of them, but had not been pleased with the false mages. Among the elves, the punishment for that was death, usually a painful one. Had she not felt a certain softness for the poor woman, a camaraderie for a fellow crewmate, Cas would have seen to her death years ago.

Every summer the tall, graceful woman who called herself her mother would take her in a carriage far from the cities, in a place so holy and feared by mortals that it had escaped the desecration of other forests. Why it was so feared, she had never been able to tell. Bursting with life and filled with strange paths and wonders, Cas had always felt at home here, always refused to leave. She would hide in the tallest trees, held her breath in the bubbling streams, but always her mother would find her and pull her out, laughing all the while. This was the only place her mother would smile or laugh, and Cas came to find the same was true of herself. Home felt empty, wrong, lifeless.

It was in her seventh year, when Cas was not yet used to her woman’s body, that her mother was more solemn than usual. She didn’t laugh or smile and told the girl harshly to sit still. They went deeper into the forest then, into places she had never been allowed, where the sun shone strangely through the leaves and the birds could not be heard. This, her mother told her, was a holy place.

They came upon strange, grand trees bent and twisted into the visages of cathedrals. But these trees had long since died, a few hollow or fallen to the ground. They stepped quietly, each solemn, their hands clasped. The grand halls were lined with paintings, ones that made her blush despite her acute knowledge of these things. She leaned closer to her mother, looking up at her, but the woman’s eyes were on the end of the hall. As they approached, Cas saw that a collection of gold thrones, each grander than the next. Her mother pulled her close, firmly, though Cas was frightened. The tall elf ran her hands over one of the chairs, her eyes sad and lonely.

“This is where my lover, my master, my heart, sat. He was a kind god and did not deserve his fate,” she said, her voice breaking. And then she picked her daughter up and placed her on the seat next to it, her eyes watering. She knelt, looking at Cas to make sure she would listen. “This is where the god who would have been your master sat. He was cruel, not faithful, and deserved his fate,” she said, stroking her daughter’s dark hair, tugging her chin up to look her in the eyes. “Whatever pain you may feel some day, and I know you will feel it as I do now, whatever emptiness, you are blessed for not having met him. Do not miss the gods. Do you understand?” The young woman nodded, but she did not.

Cas had slipped momentarily into that fuzzy place that was her memory, but was jolted out of it by the ship’s movement. Caught off guard, her usual grace and balance was lost and she slipped. She tumbled over twice before her hand shot out, gripping the side of the ship and gritting her teeth in anger, her cheeks red. Not how she was planning on starting out the voyage. She pulled herself up, rearranging the folds of her dress and leaving in a hurry, hoping her little tumble hadn’t been noticed. Certainly wouldn’t be good for her image. Unfortunately, neither was missing the revolver that had slipped from between the folds of her dress.

“Decent pilot, my ass. Probably fuckin’ the Captain to keep from getting fired,” she muttered, knowing full well the bastard had been right. Arrogant prick. Still, it made her feel better. Hoping to salvage her dignity, Cas descended the stairs and made her way on the deck, intending to find out why a child was funding their voyage.

Fort inclined his head in acknowledgement of his Aeronaut's benediction, his wolf-smile pulling tauter on the left side of his mouth until it became something like a half-hearted smirk. "Glad to be here, Cain. Getting tired of terra mostly firma." His hiss of a laugh tore itself from between his teeth like the rasp of leather on silk as he gestured vaguely upward. "Now bring me sky."

The Aeronaut moved to his station and, wonder of wonders, the ship did not shake itself to death as it slipped the bonds of the quays. The tethers were disengaged and rather than rising like a loosed cork to the level of the gathering clouds, the Ardent drifted upward into the wind like a clutch of thistledown in a summer breeze.

The Captain's head was clearing. Sailing would always set him right. Unfortunately for the First Mate.

Fort paced across the deck on his way to the bowsprit and the unparalleled view it would no doubt afford...a path which brought him close enough for a biting hiss toward the officer which had tried to leave him shanghaied.

"Tallow Vance, if ever I hear a deceitful whisper escape your lips, see a treacherous cant to your limbs, smell the vaguest hint of mutiny about your person, or even imagine that you will attempt a stunt like that again, I will, by the Golden Throne, fill you with ten-penny nails, affix you to the uppermost quarter of my mizzenmast, and have Cain set our course for the nearest electrical storm. Do you take my meaning?"

Tallow opened his mouth to make a reply, failed, licked his lips, and was about to try again when the Captain leveled an index finger. "If you no longer want to stay on this boat, we can sure as Hell fix it so you don't have to. But speak now, because ground's getting mighty far away." For a terse minute the two sailors eyed eachother, wounded pride and fear in the eyes of one, steel in the other. Vance shook his head slowly and lowered his eyes. Fort let his hand drop and jerked his head toward the recessed door which led to the lower decks. "Now, as you were, Mr. Vance."

Fort brushed by the upbraided officer and caught a rush of motion as Belo, his Innate, came staggering into view, moving with a haste which could only mean one of two things. And as there was very little chance that something was exploding (as yet, he reminded himself), it was most likely the latter. As if in courteous response to his upraised eyebrow, the Innate hung herself over the gunwhale and belched a baby rainbow. As she slumped to the deck, his lich-lit eyes followed her motion, a half-smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

The people in his employ...

Captain Fortinbras Carlyle finally gained the bowsprit and braced his hands against the edges of the gunwhale, leaning into a rising wind which tasted like equal parts approaching storm, mounting excitement, and unrivalled freedom. Fort had no church. If he had, it would be right here.

"Where's the fun, indeed..." His threadbare whisper to the world as it fell away beneath them went unheeded.

And so they were off.

The invitation fell on eager ears and Liroy sprung to standing at the mention of stowed away goods. Her returned eagerly to the site of his incarceration and rummaged through the assortment of supplies, previous squabbles forgotten. With a victorious grunt, he unveiled the jar of pickled mixed nuts and reclaimed his place on the bunk, delighting in the flavor of such an globular delicacy.

Their hard shell crunch had been replaced by a sickeningly silent bite that warmed his bones and twisted his mouth into a satiated grin. He paused his indulgence as the vessel began to purr and detach itself from the surface of the world, course set for bluer pastures and far more exotic prizes.

"The Particle Shift, it was... Wasn' it?" the question came of idleness more so than genuine curiosity. Her cared little for the name, but immeasurably for the wealth it sang of. It promised such wonderful fortune, an endless supply of whatever they fancied. Fine cuisine, lodgings wherever they roamed, vehicles of the latest make and model, property, women, the latter two being essentially the same. Spurred by his own frivolous musings, he shot upright and set a serious gaze upon Colt; a rare and laughable occurrence, but a feasible one considering the payoff to be had.

"I'll take my turn at dawn, yeh? Don't go obligin' in this 'how's your mum?' business; I don't right like it. We're as good as cooked if you go makin' a habit of it," and he damn well meant it. Liroy abhorred small talk that didn't otherwise lead down more beneficial avenues. He bore little love for his fellow man and it surely did not put wind in his sails. If it promised no ends to his liking, than he wanted no further association. "Sounds like they've got this bird's wings a-flappin'. You best go break somethin' for me to fix tomorrow."

Then Liroy could descend into this long-awaited boredom. As if in anticipation of the droll hours to come, he yawned. "An' really, we'll need somethin' tasty in here. Goobers don' last forever. Galley raid, yeah? Rough cookie up a bit."

A real meal didn't sound half bad, not that he'd be privy to one today. Colt, on the other hand, might have his fill of decent cooking if he so pleased. Liroy, unfortunately, would have to rely entirely on his brother's good graces. Though an acceptable offering today meant Colt would most likely be returned the favor on the morrow, provided that the two of them kept relatively civil tongues.

The thought of cold cuts and warm bread filled his mind and send his stomach into rumbling fits, which he attempted to silence by shoving another handful of goobers down his throat. It did quiet him... well enough, though not comfortably. The combination of dill, salt and fatty nuts would pass through and return with a vengeance. Come evening, they both would, once again, rue the foodstuffs.